


#3

by Crowlows19



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Batfamily, Batfamily Feels, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, batfam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-08-10 01:08:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20126854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowlows19/pseuds/Crowlows19
Summary: Bruce had never expected to have Jack Drake in his office asking how best to parent Tim, but here he was and the moment was surreal.





	#3

Bruce had known from the start that Tim Drake would have been a different kind of Robin. Even his introduction to Bruce’s life had been different from the other two. He hadn’t been newly orphaned, in danger, and with nowhere to go. He hadn’t been a street kid faced with the boost of a life time, a tire iron, and a distracted Batman. He had been remarkably full of hope and Bruce had been remarkably not full of hope when Dick had introduced the child as Bruce’s stalker. 

But they had done well over the years and Bruce had always trusted Tim’s stone cold judgement of every situation he was faced with. While his other two Robins had been skilled, incredibly skilled, reading a situation and thinking six moves ahead seemed to be an actual superpower for Tim. Which was why Bruce was always astounded when Tim was surprised by Jack Drake. 

Tim had been the only Robin to start his training with both of his parents still alive and in picture. That fact alone had made Bruce incredibly reluctant to take the kid on. Having the neighbor boy know about his secret identity was one thing, having Jack and Janet Drake know about it too was quite another. 

But Tim’s parents were actually never around. Bruce was used to this kind of behavior among the parents of Gotham’s elite. Kids weren’t really kids; they were trophies that you only took off the shelf when you needed to brag. And that was clearly what Tim was. 

Tim’s parents mostly sent him to boarding school so that the both of them could travel as needed for their work with Drake Industries. There was about a year or two though when Tim had convinced his parents that the local yet extremely prestigious Gotham Academy would challenge him more and instead of staying in the dorms, Tim finally got to sleep in his own bedroom. 

However, the thought of a twelve year old puttering around that big empty house by himself hadn’t sat well with Bruce. So, more often then not he kept the boy occupied with training and homework until it was late enough that he could send him upstairs to sleep instead of to the adjoining property. Tim had basically ended up moving into one of the empty rooms in the family wing just down the hall from Bruce’s own bedroom. 

Even when his parents were home Tim would leave most of his things there, packing an overnight bag to spend the night with his parents. When Janet had been killed and Jack had been paralyzed, Tim had simply stopped going home and Bruce had filed for guardianship and taken the boy in as a foster parent, something he’d previously done for Dick and Jason. 

And when Jack had recovered enough to take the boy back, Bruce had been both incredibly happy for Tim and remarkably sad to see him go. But he wasn’t Tim’s parent and in the end he had to sit back while again and again, Tim was confused about how his dad was reacting to being a full time parent for the first time. While Bruce could see the inevitable problem coming from a mile away, Tim was blindsided by his Dad insisting they make plans, and then taking off with Dana for a weekend seemingly on a whim. 

When Tim had spent that weekend holed up in the manor taking his feelings out on a case, obsessively blocking out everything else, Bruce had really no choice but to simply make sure the kid finally went to sleep sometime early Sunday morning. And when Jack Drake had figured out what Tim had been up to all these years and forced his son back into civilian life, Bruce hadn’t stepped in then either, despite Dick’s vehement instance that he do so. 

He simply let the kid go. He kept an eye on him of course, running programs from the cave that tracked Tim through his civilian life. There were censors on the window to Tim’s bedroom and he knew each and every time the boy snuck out, usually after an argument with his father. It was clear to him that Tim was struggling but still Bruce didn’t step in; he wanted to respect the Drake family boundaries. 

What he had never expected was for Jack to come to him.

00000

Bruce had been in his office, pouring over paperwork when his assistant had called him to let him know that Jack Drake wanted to see him if he had a moment. Bruce had almost forgotten to answer he was so surprised. The last time he’d seen Jack, the other man had put a gun in his face and ordered him to stay away from his son. 

“Send him in,” Bruce replied. Jack sauntered in a few seconds later, clearly comfortable in the surroundings. He may not have been at the top of his game anymore but he could still work an executive with the best of them. It didn’t even seem to matter that Jack’s jeans and sweater were far less appropriate for an office like this than what he’d been used to. 

“What can I do for you?” Bruce asked, tone friendly but he didn’t get up from his desk or try to shake Jack’s hand. Bruce saw his assistant shut the door. 

“I just wanted to talk with you about Tim,” Jack said, and smirked when that clearly got Bruce’s full attention immediately. 

“What about him?” he asked. 

“He’s been acting strange,” Jack said and Bruce was a little taken aback. Based on his surveillance, Tim had been a little down and muted, but he was mostly acting as he always did. 

“How so?”

“He’s acting like a teenager,” Jack said and rolled his eyes at himself. “I know that sounds stupid considering he is a teenager, but you know him. He’s never acted like that before.”

“No, he’s usually a very mature acting boy,” Bruce agreed. “But he is still just fifteen and I’m sure the last few years have been an….adjustment. He might just be working through some things.”

“I understand that,” Jack said, almost hissing in annoyance. “What I don’t get are all the mood swings and he’s not doing what I ask him to, ever.”

“What do you mean?” Bruce asked, genuinely curious. His surveillance was good but even he couldn’t get an accurate emotional read from a distance. Especially not with someone as highly trained as Tim. 

“I mean he’s sneaking out, won’t go to school, won’t sleep and when he does it’s at incredibly odd hours. I know he’s not doing the Robin thing anymore, that much I trust him on, but he’s still up to no good.”

Bruce dearly wanted to grit his teeth at the last comment. He knew that half of what Jack said was about their problems as father and son, but he didn’t say so. He redirected to something else instead.

“He’s skipping school?” 

“Yeah, he was hacking into the school’s database and changing his attendance record so that I would never know.”

Which sounded about right since Bruce hadn’t seen anything wrong in Tim’s attendance record either. 

“Yes, he’s done that before,” he told Jack who looked shocked. “He was skipping school while you were in the coma. He gets obsessive and finds ways to feed it. That time he was investigating Dark Web crimes. He’d missed a month of school before I figured it out.”

“Wow,” Jack said. Bruce could tell he didn’t know much about Tim’s time as Robin, probably deliberately, but he looked impressed at what his son could accomplish given half a chance. “So how did you get him back into school?”

“I benched him and took the computer,” Bruce replied. “Also, punishment miles.”

“Punishment miles?” Jack inquired looking he almost didn’t want to know. 

“That’s what the boys call it when I make them run miles for doing something stupid,” he said. “It’s really just another way to make them train. Teenagers can be shockingly lazy, even teen superheroes.”

“Well, I have a feeling that if I try that he’ll just laugh at me,” Jack replied. 

“A good, old-fashioned grounding might work,” Bruce suggested. He took a brief moment to reflect on how strange this conversation was. He would never have expected to have Jack Drake in his office, asking him how to parent his own child. 

“Oh, I tried,” he said, almost snorting with laughter. “The second Dana and I left he threw a party at the house. We came back and the whole thing was trashed.” Bruce knew about that party. He and Nightwing had decided to check on Tim during a particularly slow patrol. They hadn’t planned on speaking with him, just some long distance surveillance. What they’d found was a kegger in full swing. Bruce had been concerned but Dick had insisted it was normal and he’d let it go. 

“How long were you gone?” he asked. They’d been by at two in the morning. There was no way Jack and Dana had simply been out to dinner. 

“We had an anniversary get away planned,” Jack said. “We only left for a week.” Bruce knew immediately what the problem was. Clearly Tim and Jack weren’t adjusting to each other well. 

“Jack, I don’t know what you want me say here,” Bruce told him. “I had my ways with dealing with his…teenager moments, but those really only work Batman to Robin, not father to son. I wasn’t ever his parent.”

Jack’s face was too open and Bruce could see in his eyes that he didn’t believe him. They both knew that it was Bruce who drove Tim to Gotham Academy more often than not, that it was Bruce who had taken the boy in during the worst time of his life, and it was Bruce who could get through to Tim in ways even his own father couldn’t. Parental guilt alone wasn’t going to work anymore; Tim was too angry. 

“Would you talk to him?” Jack finally asked, swallowing his pride. “I just want him to feel better.”

“If that’s what you want,” Bruce replied. “Be prepared for a fight though. Tim’s the kind to go down swinging.”

“Isn’t that how all of you people are though?” Jack asked, getting up and letting himself out without even a good bye. But Jack had given Bruce a lot to think about and in the end he had a gut feeling that something was happening beyond the normal growing pains. This was Tim after all, and Bruce should never have let anyone tell him that Tim acting like a teenager was normal.

00000

Bruce had come to the Drake home on a Saturday at 3 in the afternoon. He had always let the boys sleep in late on the weekends but even he put his foot down somewhere around 1 pm. Or at least, Alfred put his foot down. However, when Jack opened the door, he immediately let Bruce know that Tim was still asleep. 

“Every time I try to get him up, he tells me to go away,” Jack said. “I threatened to ground him but he doesn’t care about that anymore.”

“Hmm,” Bruce replied, already halfway up the stairs. Jack followed him but didn’t try to stop him. When they got to Tim’s room Bruce opened the door quietly, padded across the room, confirmed the boy was still asleep, reached down, and calmly flipped the mattress off the bed. Pillows, blankets, and teenager all went flying with a shout. 

Bruce moved around the bed so that he could make eye contact with the boy tryign to untangle himself. 

“Oh, good,” Bruce said acidly, Tim’s eyes wide with shock. “You’re awake. I was wondering if three in the afternoon was too early.”

Never one to back away from a challenge, Tim’s eyes narrowed. “You’re one to talk,” he shot back. “What are you doing here?”

“Get up, get dressed, and meet us down stairs,” Bruce said in reply and left the room. He missed the glare Tim sent his father as Jack followed him. 

00000

“Where’s Dana?” Bruce asked, helping himself to a cup of coffee. 

“With clients,” Jack replied. He was pacing, clearly having second thoughts, but Bruce didn’t have sympathy for him. He had been the one to set this up in the first place. They heard Tim stomping down the stairs as fast as he could go and the kid skidded into the kitchen still trying to pull his shirt on. When he managed it he glared at Bruce. 

“What are you doing here?” he asked. He was almost bug eyed. 

“Can’t guess, detective?” Bruce asked, absurdly enjoying himself. He and Tim had always had the best verbal spars. The kid was smart, already smarter than him in a lot of ways. Bruce had always enjoyed the challenge. 

“If this is about that stupid attendance record,” Tim practically snarled. “I’ll just go back to school.” Bruce narrowed his eyes. He had never seen Tim this angry before, even when he’d had every reason to be. The boy just didn’t get angry. He almost felt as if he was talking to Jason, not Tim. 

But he had suspected this would be the case when Jack had come to see him. Bruce never went into a situation blind when he could help it and he certainly wasn’t going to go in blind when it concerned a Robin. 

“No, this is about your unauthorized patrols,” Bruce said, strategically ignoring Jack Drake’s stunned face. “What do you think you’re doing? Patrolling without armor? Have you lost your mind?”

He knew if he kept pushing, the boy would snap and he’d have confirmation. If he was anything like the others Bruce had been running into on the streets lately, the angrier he got, the easier he’d be to fool. He just hoped that Jack would have the sense to stay quiet.

“I didn’t do anything!” Tim practically shouted. He balled his fists, ready to go, ready to fight. It had been so long since he’d last thrown a punch. 

“Yes, you did,” Bruce said, keeping his voice nasty to get the boy riled up as fast as possible. It apparently didn’t take much these days. Tim threw a wild, sloppy punch that was easily blocked and before Jack Drake could even make a noise in surprise, Bruce had a needle in Tim’s neck, injecting a sedative. He was unconscious in seconds.

00000

“It’s a variation of the fear gas Dr. Crane uses,” Tim said. He’d come to in the cave, his Dad sitting in a chair very uncomfortably, while Alfred checked his vitals. He hadn’t seen Bruce but the man appeared in seconds asking for a report. Jack had seemed annoyed at that but had held his tongue when Tim took it in stride and started talking.

He told them about the case that had seemingly fallen into his lap and how, driven by his own internal hardwiring and extreme boredom, he’d taken to his old ways. With his bike and his camera, he’d started investigating a strange new gas that seemed to do nothing. He’d been accidentally exposed when Crane had stealthily hit a whole group of people on the street, Tim and his camera among them. 

The anger had started to build sometime after but had been so gradual and so natural feeling that he’d been able to brush it aside until it was too late. 

“I know where it’s being made though,” he finished and scribbled an address on a case file Bruce shoved under his nose.

“You know better than to be working cases without permission and without proper gear,” Bruce said, clearly pissed off. Tim could barely look him in the eye and it was all made worse by having Jack Drake standing right behind his mentor.

“I’m sorry,” Tim replied though they both knew he’d probably do it again. 

“You could have been killed,” Bruce kept going. He wanted so badly to launch into what Dick called the The I'm Dissapointed in You Lecture, but Jack Drake was standing there and that should have been his job. Bruce eyed him to see what he was planning on doing and when he didn’t see what he wanted, he started in anyway. 

Jack let him lecture Tim for a solid thirty minutes before Bruce finally ran out of things to say.

"Jack, can I talk to you?" Bruce asked and moved away. Jack followed him until they were out of earshot. He was very aware of Tim watching every move they made.

"The gas is clear of his system," Bruce said when they stopped walking. "But those feelings Tim had, the ones that made him act out, all of that is still there."

"So, the problem isn't fixed," Jack confirmed, turning his head to eye his son. "Well, now that the gas isn't getting in the way, maybe those heart to hearts will finally work."

Jack gave him a grin and went back to Tim. Bruce covertly watched them from the work bench, tuning the tech in his cowl. It wasn't long before Jack leaned down and Tim gave his father a hug. Bruce smiled softly. Maybe it would all work out. Then he glanced up again and saw Tim eyeing his Robin uniform in the display case over Jack's shoulder. 

Bruce made a mental note to find a new way to wire the sensors to Tim's window. It was only a matter of time before the boy figured it out and disabled the ones already installed.


End file.
